Gloria (29 page)

In between we do what we always do. Sit on the veranda with the radio playing and shaking the drink to cool it ’round the ice; and listening to Sybil talk ’bout how things need to get better for the working man, and more, working woman; and looking at Miss Sissy ’cross the road with her thin grey balding head sitting in her rocking chair rolling backward and forward smoking her pipe and when the thing not in her mouth watching her lips moving so you could almost hear the tut-tutting that was coming from her.

And while I was sitting there I realise that, even though I was happy that the white man and his queen wasn’t ruling over their slave nation no more, the only thing I could think about was what Ernesto say to me about liberation not being achieved through the mere act of proclaiming independence but when economic domination of a people is brought to an end.

A week later Pao come over to Barbican. It a long time since I see him and longer since I get a chance to talk to him because all he say to me is, ‘Yu and Sybil finish running ’round town getting everybody to go to Cuba?’

So I tell him it not what we doing and he say, ‘Well, whatever it is it suit yu. It put a liveliness in yu. Yu sure yu not up to something I don’t know about?’

‘Like what? What yu think I got time for?’

He laugh. That same laugh that been making me smile all these years. Like a mischievous schoolboy with his head lowered and a big grin on his face. It was open-hearted and undefended. A look I couldn’t imagine him showing to anybody else but me.

After that all he was doing was fretting over how some British army captain get a little Chinese girl called Merleen Chin pregnant. And she only twelve years old. And how her grandfather looking to him to fix it and he don’t know how to work it out without old man Chin losing face which is the worse thing that can happen to a Chinese.

‘Why this so important to yu?’

‘Important! Yu serious? Chin is the head a the Chinatown Committee. If I cyan fix this I cyan fix anything.’

Truth was Dr Morrison already tell me all about it. Late one night in Franklyn Town after the card club finish and he come next door for one last drink and some peppermints before he go home. Told me all about how Pao going let him and Margaret adopt Merleen’s baby because Margaret can’t have none herself. And what I thought was how good that was of Pao to give the baby and the Morrisons a chance. And to give Merleen the chance to finish her schooling and have a life without a baby dragging on her heels. Not like those girls over Margaret’s home or Auntie running away to Kingston with me wrapped in a shawl.

The captain wasn’t no news to me. I already hear all about him from Fingernail over Passmore Town because a while back he was asking her if she have any young-young girls. And she tell him, ‘Go ’way man, what yu think this is?’ That is what she say anyway. But her telling me, that whole conversation, was just a bit of tittle-tattle so she could build herself up to asking me if they could increase their percentage on the money we lending.

So I say to her, ‘No man. A deal is a deal. Nothing change since we shake hands and drink down the rum together.’

And she scratch her head with that same nasty fingernail that I swear the nail varnish must be so cheap it chipping off before it even dry, because every time you see her it look just the same.

‘Yu not even going tek a minute to think ’bout it, Gloria?’

‘There not nothing to think about. If yu want more money, mek more business.’ And even as I say it I knew she wasn’t going take no for an answer. And the sideways glance Sybil give me, the one I catch outta the corner of my eye, tell me the same thing. But more. That maybe I was too hasty turning Fingernail down like that. Maybe I should have sweeten it a little bit more. Maybe I was storing up trouble for down the road.

But that was then, and right now what I wanted to talk to Pao about was how we going make sure Esther get herself a good education, because there was no way I wanted her to end up like me. Or like him come to that. Jamaica didn’t have no tolerance for the likes of us no more. Those days had gone. And just like I said to the Party faithful, the future had to have equality and opportunity in it. For women as well as men. And education was the key to that.

‘The child only ten years old. What yu fret yuself about?’

‘Ten years old, that is exactly when yu have to be fretting. Next year she not a baby any more. She got to go to high school and where yu think she going go?’

Pao think I want Esther to go to Immaculate Conception where he worried the nuns going want to know who her papa is and he don’t want Fay finding out because according to him she don’t know nothing about him having a child with me.

‘You think Fay dunno? What daydream yu living in if yu think Fay don’t know?’

But he just stand there in the kitchen like he forget about the school troubles Esther already have. Or maybe it don’t matter. And even though I keep mentioning it to him it not doing no good.

Then he disappear. No hide nor hair of him did I see. When he finally turn up he say St Andrew and Alpha Academy two good schools. And yes, he would think that because they both got plenty black girls. Not like the great Immaculate that so white. And even thinking that way not worrying him because Pao consider himself enlightened. He run with his little gang of black boys and that is good enough for him. But inside I know he really fixing on how dark Esther’s skin is. So I decide to tell him some home truth ’bout how independence didn’t change anything in Jamaica. That it wasn’t no Chinese revolution like he always telling me Zhang talking ’bout. The peasants didn’t get no liberation. And it wasn’t no Cuba either.

‘The same thing that was going on before is the same thing that is going on now. The British take all the profit from the plantations, and they still taking it. And now the Americans and the rest of them going take the big profit from the bauxite and all the hotels and factories they busy throwing up all over the place, and Jamaica going to be left exactly where we always been.

‘Jamaica look good on the surface, but unless yu make sure your daughter get a good education she going end up with the same choices I had, the same two choices that is waiting for her because she is a woman and because of the colour of her skin. And I don’t see her wanting to be no domestic, not any more than I did.’

He silent like he can’t believe I am talking this way to him. The funny thing about St Andrew and Alpha was that it was the same two schools Father Michael mention to me. So right away I knew where Pao been to get his advice. And when I tell him it the same priest that Fay running to with her woes all he do is vex some more over how I know ’bout Father Michael, ’til in the end I say to him, ‘You give up the right to say anything to me ’bout what I do or what I know when you decide to go marry Fay Wong.’ And that shut him up. It surprise me though, because I never take Pao for the sorta man to go talking to a priest.

Esther say she don’t want to go to any more convent school so I put her name down at St Andrew High School for Girls and she take the entrance examination and pass it. We go get the uniform and such, which she excited about because she know St Andrew is a good school. The little white blouse fit perfect but we have to get the pinafore altered. When it done I say to her that she should put it on and go show to her father the next time he come.

She do it. She go in the living room and twizzle ’round in front of him two times and then she just walk out without saying a single word to him. I feel sorry for her that she got no idea how to be with him even though I keep encouraging her to tell him something or maybe ask him a question. And to be fair to her, she been trying her best but it not getting her nowhere because Pao can’t make it beyond, ‘Hello, how yu doing?’

When Pao gone I say to her, ‘Yu don’t want to say nothing to yu father?’

‘Like what?’

‘Like maybe thank him for paying the school fees, or ask him if he think the uniform pretty.’

‘What would I have to thank him for? You could have paid the fees yourself. We didn’t need anything from him.’

She right and the only reason I let him do it was because I wanted him to feel like he was taking some responsibility. But the way she say it and then ease her weight back on her leg it was like she steadying herself to have some big fight with me.

‘Esther he is still your father.’

And then she really set herself and say, ‘I heard him. In the kitchen the day you were fighting about Immaculate.’

‘That was just a misunderstanding Esther.’

‘What, that the nuns might misunderstand that he is my father? Or his wife might misunderstand that I am his daughter? I was standing behind the dining-room door. I heard every single word. And I heard you too, telling him about how I am going to end up with the same two choices you had and not wanting to be a domestic.’ She pause and then she say, ‘What was the other choice?’

‘The other choice?’

‘Apart from being a domestic.’

It was like being plunged into water so deep and so cold your whole body go into shock. You freeze and you can’t breathe.

‘It don’t matter. It not important.’

‘It is what they said isn’t it?’

‘Who?’

‘The girls at school.’

‘That is what yu fighting about?’

Her face was pure anger. Rage, right down to its core.

‘Esther . . .’

‘Don’t Esther me.’

‘It was a long time ago. Long before you were born. It all behind us now.’

‘Is it?’

‘Esther, I love you. Your father love you. Isn’t that enough?’

She think on it and then she say, ‘It would be better if I didn’t have any father at all. If maybe he was dead, or you never knew who he was in the first place.’

‘Don’t talk like that girl. Yu know yu don’t mean it.’

‘I do mean it. I already told Father Michael. And I also told him about the letter and him from Cuba.’

‘Yu tell him that!’ I can hear how my voice raising so I calm myself and I say, ‘Yu got to have roots Esther. Otherwise yu can never make sense of your life.’

‘I’ve got roots. I have you and Gang-gang, and Aunt Marcia and Aunt Sybil. That is enough for me. I don’t need a father, especially one that can’t even bring himself to say, “Yes, that is my daughter right there.”’ And then she walk off into her bedroom and shut the door.

Two minutes later she open it again and say to me, ‘Will you come with me to Father Michael some time?’

‘I thought your chats with him was private. Between you and him. That is what he tell me.’

‘Not if I ask you to come.’

So I say yes and she close the door.

Later on when Esther fast asleep and me and Auntie catching some night air on the veranda I turn to her and I say, ‘Tell me ’bout Antoinette.’

‘What Antoinette?’

‘Yu know, Gloria Antoinette Campbell.’

She stare straight into my eyes like she searching for something, like she probing deep into my soul. And then she turn her head away to the street and the dark.

‘Antoinette was a slave. When she come to di plantation she was just a girl and di slave master tek one look at her and give her that name straight off. And after that she never have no other name. Not even di one she come wid from Africa because she was Antoinette and she never wanted to be nothing else. So di story go. And right away he tek her into di big house and bed her and she become his in every way possible. Everybody think he just going keep her like dis ’til di next young slave girl come along to turn his head. But then he surprise everybody when he go marry her and Antoinette was so happy she was singing and dancing all over di place. And then after that he tek her to Haiti because he was a Frenchman and that was where he come from. And Antoinette wasn’t no slave no more. She was a lady and she leave all a that behind her.’

‘And when she go to Haiti did she go live on another plantation? Another plantation with African slaves?’

‘That was where di story end, Gloria. With happiness that Antoinette not no slave no more.’

‘But it not happy is it? Because when she go to Haiti Antoinette would have live on another plantation where she wouldn’t be nobody. She wouldn’t be slave and she wouldn’t be mistress. She wouldn’t belong anywhere at all. She would be a lonely island.’

I think on it little bit more and then I say, ‘You think the story end happy but it didn’t. It end sad because Antoinette wouldn’t have nowhere to settle her heart. Yu cyan be happy for not being a slave while slavery still going on and yu people still in chains. Yu have to get rid a slavery before yu can be happy.’

Auntie take a long time before she speak and then she say, ‘I tell yu this di first time I come to Franklyn Town and yu try give me tea to drink. Slavery not only di chains that bind yu hands and feet, it di chains that bind yu mind. So yu can still be a slave even after all di slaves in di land been set free. I tek what yu saying ’bout Antoinette. I think yu have a point. But this not just some old story ’bout a slave girl. Slavery done and gone a long time back. But you Gloria, yu still a slave. A slave that still not forgive herself for letting them catch you. Like it was your fault, maybe for being so stupid or slow, or maybe careless or irresponsible.